The moratorium on offshore drilling has cost Texas 2500 jobs $622 million in GDP and $153 million in lost wages"
Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON D.C. Elizabeth Ames Jones Chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission & Republican Senate candidate testified before the House Natural Resources Committee in Washington D.C. on Wednesday criticizing what she called a permitorium" on offshore drilling permits.
The moratorium on offshore drilling has cost Texas 2500 jobs $622 million in GDP and $153 million in lost wages" Jones said.
President Obama and his administration are displaying a willful ignorance of the positive effects offshore drilling has on job creation American energy security & government revenue.
President Obamas foot dragging on offshore drilling permits is disgraceful and its leading to higher energy prices the need to import more Middle East oil and lost jobs in Texas" said Jones.
Jones testified at the invitation of Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA) Chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources. The full text of Elizabeths Congressional testimony today may be found below.
Elizabeth Ames Jones Challenges President Obama On Offshore Drilling
March 16 2011
I would like to thank Chairman Hastings and Ranking Member Markey and the members for the opportunity to testify today. My written statement is more comprehensive but now I would like to hit the high points.
Americans are faced yet again with another round of increasing oil prices and the accompanying household budget crunches that come with higher gasoline prices and then increases in the cost of everything else like groceries. Being on the brink of recovery from the recession this is the worst time for Americans to have to put another notch in their belts as energy costs go up.
I would like to share my perspective on the Department of Interiors permitorium for drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. To give you some background the Railroad Commission of Texas (RRC) of which I am Chairman regulates the drilling for oil and natural gas in and our rules and regulations have been formulated over the last 100 years. Our jurisdiction extends to 3 leagues offshore or a little over 10 miles.
Texas is the top energy producing state in the country for both natural gas and oil. Over 30 of all the natural gas and about 20 of all the oil onshore in America comes from Texas. Thats almost 350 million barrels of oil a year and 7.7 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. The largest natural gas play in the country is in Texas called the Barnett Shale. The latest technology has been perfected there which makes other shale plays in Texas New York Pennsylvania North Dakota and others around the country possible. This is great for America.
Our countrys energy security will rely on oil for generations to come. What is on my mind today is the oil that is under the Gulf of Mexico the American jobs that it takes to drill and produce it the American families and businesses that need it and the federal coffers that could surely use the royalties and lease bonuses - now more than ever.
We have a moral duty to Americans to develop these resources and I would like to share with you what is happening on the front lines of energy production.
It may be an inconvenient truth but there is still a de facto moratorium against serious offshore drilling in the waters that surround the United States the offshore Gulf of Mexico and offshore Alaska. Thats simply the reality.
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet. One can call it what one likes but there is still a work stoppage an embargo if you will on American
companies working in America. Since last fall when the moratorium was lifted in name only only two deep water permits have been issued.
Somebody is putting lipstick on a pig. Those permits were for the re-entry of wells that had already been partially drilled. They were not…I repeat…not for new wells.
Statistics on a page simply do not reflect the lives that have been changed by this embargo. Last summer a study determined that approximately 98 of the more than 15000 businesses in the Gulf States impacted by the moratorium are considered small and 85 of those have less than 10 employees
These businesses employ over 153000 people. These include jobs in the support industries the infrastructure it takes to drill each well. Who is typically drilling these wells? Good solid American companies…Independents that find more oil onshore and offshore than the majorslike BPare the ones most affected. These independents cant pick up and move some place overseas to drill in other countries deep water and certainly the workers on the rigs and the support services cant move to places like South America to help them recover their oil.
We in Texas have lost approximately 2500 jobs $622 million in gross domestic product and $153 million in wages. It doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure out that the more time it takes to issue permits the more likely these numbers could double and even triple.
With instability in the Middle East and the current monetary policy the last thing the market needs is less supply. EIAs projected decline in production is a fact not lost on investors and the oil markets. A one-year delay could result in a half a million barrel per day cut in world supply.
The talk of tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is nonsensical when we have a reserve that is strategically placed with a lot more oil in it than the 727 million barrels that are being stored in the SPR. The Outer Continental Shelf is estimated to have close to 100 billion barrels of oil. We need to use it when we need it and we need it now.
Its disingenuous to claim that issuing one or two deepwater permits for wells already drilled constitutes a lift of the moratorium. Dozens of permits are still in limbo for previously permitted wells and we dont have a clear path forward on the thousands of leases that are waiting to be drilled. This would never be acceptable to the voters and taxpayers in Texas if the RRC was in the captains chair and it isnt acceptable to a supermajority of Americans who support oil and gas production.
As elected officials at the RRC we can be voted out of office if we dont deliver. But when regulators are not accountable to the people then
Congress must provide statutory direction and oversight.
Analysis has found that Gulf of Mexico offshore activities could generate as much as $300 billion in government revenues alone in the next 10 years. These are revenues that could be utilized to invest in our nations future.
You and your colleagues could provide the same benefits for Americans everywhere across our nation by insisting on regulatory certainty partnered with environmental protections and a culture that truly understands what it means to appreciate and use our nations mineral assets as we do in Texas.
Thank you for your time and attention. I look forward to addressing your questions.
